[color=blue:ff634a1f8c][size=18:ff634a1f8c]If you look and one need not look too far, you can find homeopathic formulations on most drug store shelves for use in treating illness.
Should they be there?
If not how do we take action to get them banned?
Should the exception for homeopathic medicines in the Pure Food and Drug act be retained.
I just posted some stuff about considering possible medical benefits for acupuncture, but when it comes to homeopathy, I think it really IS quackery. Not only does it make no sense, but it also has absolutely no scientific effects beyond placebo effects. And that dilution stuff—I don’t think so.
As for the Food and Drug Act, I’d have to look up what that says exactly. I think it said that homeopathic remedies could be sold as “standard” remedies. I think one’s view on that would also depend on one’s view of law. Should the FDA be able to ban things that it thinks are harmful to or ineffective for a person? Or should a person be allowed to choose to smoke or take these remedies or whatever?
I think that labeling restrictions are good. But the only way to really combat these things, I suppose, is through education.
I agree with Doug Homeopathic medicine is total quackery and a fraud that should be banned.
[quote author=“debbie”]Should the FDA be able to ban things that it thinks are harmful to or ineffective for a person? Or should a person be allowed to choose to smoke or take these remedies or whatever?
I think that labeling restrictions are good. But the only way to really combat these things, I suppose, is through education.
We rarely look at these things from the perspective of the seller or mfgr. If we did that more often we’d have a different view I think. FX why in the world should Parke Davis or Merck be permitted to label plain water as a remedy for back pain by putting the information on the label in tiny letters that it is a homeopathic medication. Don’t the drug companies make enough profit on real drugs? should we help them by letting them sell plain water for $128.00 a gallon. Put another way should we let them put water in a capsule and sell the product as Carter’s Little Liver Pills so long as it is labeled homeopathic. Doing it that way the profit ought to be astronomical!Is it no wonder that the lobbyist are given free rein whenever anyone tries to stop this?
AAARGH!
Why should big pharma be stuck with multi-hundred-million-dollar bills to take a compound through phase III FDA trials, while some huckster with a faucet can sell “homeopathics” that claim to cure the precise same illness?
... not to mention so-called “herbal remedies” that, for all we know, may be very dangerous. We won’t know, since they have never been tested.
My mom is big into homeopathy. She has her own healer and stuff. It breaks my heart.
Her son (my second to oldest brother) was killed in a car accident. Her friend, who had lost her own son to a motorcycle accident, was very supportive (she owned an “angel shop” which also sold antiques that her freethinking husband digs up for fun). My mom saw John Edwards and is convinced he is true-to-life, and I hate him for it.
She has a terrible rash that never goes away, and she is seeing her healer to fix it as well as an MD.
She read a book that stated blood type determines what food you can eat.
She’s a really good woman, and she’s not stupid. I think, unfortunately, that so many things in her life culminated in her becoming a new-agey Catholic. I don’t think growing up in the 60’s and 70’s helped
Belief in this stuff is very widespread, Gaddy. I know many otherwise smart people who are attracted by all sorts of alternative medicine nonsense.
The basic problem is that the human brain was not evolved to find statistical controls intuitive. They have to be taught.
But the only way to distinguish an effective from an ineffective treatment is by double blind, statistically controlled tests.
So I’m afraid the human species is condemned to be taken in by these frauds forever. Or in the words of PT Barnum, “There’s a sucker born every minute.”
Hi Gaddy,
There is one small chink in a homeopath’s armor. The bottle that the pills come in must list the ingredients. I’ve looked at several of these lists - of course there is absolutely nothing on the list that has any efficacy. If it is a liquid the list shows water as the ingredient along with false color and maybe some sugar or lemon for taste,
Mom can get the ingredients at the grocery store. When I showed the contents of the bottle to a friend who was using one of these supposed medications he quit buying it. That was only a small victory but who knows maybe he started reading the contents lists.
Jim, I had no idea that the bottles have to list the ingredients - I thought that was the big problem, that it is a totally unregulated industry and basically they can put anything in those ridiculous remedies. Is this a recent development? That is really good news, now all we need is for the bottles to list scientific proof to back up their claims.
[quote author=“emw121199”]... now all we need is for the bottles to list scientific proof to back up their claims.
Yes, that’s the rub. Here are a few sentences from the intro paragraph on Homeopathy from Stephen Barrett’s outstanding QuackWatch site.
“Homeopathic “remedies” enjoy a unique status in the health marketplace: They are the only category of quack products legally marketable as drugs. This situation is the result of two circumstances. First, the 1938 Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, which was shepherded through Congress by a homeopathic physician who was a senator, recognizes as drugs all substances included in the Homeopathic Pharmacopeia of the United States. Second, the FDA has not held homeopathic products to the same standards as other drugs.”
Since the Congress saw fit to explicitly exclude homeopathic treatments from oversight, it will presumably take a rewriting of the laws to get homeopathy off the shelves.
For further excellent info on homeopathy, see Stephen Barrett’s sister site:
I’ve been to Quackwatch and really loved his expose of Gary Null, especially when he describes how Null got his degree’s. He does a fabulous job, and I wish there were more doctors willing to do what he does. If anyone knows any similar other sites, I’d love to hear about them. I’m going to Homeowatch right after this post.
There was a recent story on alternative medicine in the Miami Herald’s daily magazine, Tropic, published with the paper. It was a report about the use of “homeopathy” and other types of AM in conjunction with standard medical treatment in a major local medical school and teaching hospital. I can’t be more specific but the paper can be searched at http://www.miamiherald.com for the article.
I remember i was outraged but had no time for expressing it because of my work. Now I have the time having gotten the work out of the way for a bit. I intend to try to find the story. If anyone else does please put up the link.
It is ridiculous for a hospital to be advancing the cause of this quack treatment system.
Jim
Gee, I don’t know what you people are getting upset about. Aren’t we all for raising the intelligence of the general population? Figure that those who take the homeopathic remedies aren’t very bright, and they have a higher likelihood of dying from their malady. So, homeopathy is just one more small Darwinian pressure to move intelligence up. :D
